


Stay For Me

by Flowesque



Category: In the Loop (2009) & The Thick of It, The Thick of It (TV)
Genre: Gen, Reader-Insert, Swearing, There's a lot of swearing, Tumblr, Yes I know the title sucks., as is when Malcolm's involved., prompt, too-many-twelvies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-24
Updated: 2016-04-24
Packaged: 2018-06-04 03:47:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6640120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Flowesque/pseuds/Flowesque
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tumblr Prompt made by an anonymous user:</p><p>You think you could do a Malcolm/Reader in which the Reader is decides to quit their job after a fight at work with Malc and he tries to convince the Reader to stay and confesses his feelings towards the Reader and the Reader thinks Malc found out about the Reader's feelings and is mocking them? Fluff ensues? THANKS :) YOU ROCK.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stay For Me

**Author's Note:**

> Second thing also moved over to the A03 website. Fluff is meant to ensue, but I felt that there was already a lot of writing as is. If wanted, I will write a second chapter in which to put in some fluff.
> 
> Enjoy! -Mod Flow from the @too-many-twelvies Tumblr blog

You take a deep breathe, and knock.

“Come the fuck in, or fuck the fuck off.” The gravelly voice said. You entered.

Malcolm was scribbling on his whiteboard, talking to a person on his phone. He wrote on some dates, notes, and cursed as he mispelled a word. You took a seat in front his desk and watched the man finish up. He finally looked to see who had come in, and upon seeing you, straightened up. “Yeah, ah, I’ll call you back later. This is fine for now. Bye.” Malcolm hung up and turned back to you, smiling. “Hello.”

“Hi.” You gave him a worried look. “I-If that was important, I can come back later..”

“No, no, it’s all good. Don’t worry.” Malcolm moved to sit at his desk. “Now. The report I was waiting for.”

“A-Ah! Yes, right, erm, here.” You dug through your folder you had carried into his office. You gulped as you pulled out the stapled three page booklet, and handed it to him. He put his reading specs on and perused the content.

You sat there, rooted to your seat. Watching the predator assess your work. Would he leave you alone? Or would you get a Tuckering? You mentally panicked from thinking of the many Tuckerings you’ve seen your colleagues endure. Would this be the day?

His face contorted into one of disgust as he flipped the page.

Oh no. You had done something wrong.

Malcolm didn’t even bother to read the second page through as he skipped to the next.

This was it.

“What the actual fuck have you shat onto these pieces of fuckin paper?” He threw the offending sheets onto his desk, and looked at you. “I mean, that was utter bollocks. That was utter,” Malcolm stood up and you cowered in your seat. “fucking,” His voice rose. “BOLLOCKS!”

You were dead.

“I can’t fucking believe these ‘reports’,” He spat. “Are on my fucking desk right now! How the fuck did you mess this fucking easy shit up? Motherfucking, I don’t even have the shitblasted energy to even begin with the errors you have fucking manifested!” Malcolm rubbed his temple. “Jesus fuck, you sorry excuse for a shitbag. We went through this fucking shite for an hour, you knew what I fuckin wanted! Tell me, tell me,” Malcolm leaned in close to you over the table, his eyes dark and steely cold. “Explain to me how this filfth of a ‘report’ turned out!”

“I-I.. I don’t know what I did wrong?” His eyes became little balls of fire.

“YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT THE EVERLASTING CUNTSHIT YOU HAVE DONE WRONG? This,” Malcolm threw the papers at you, and you fumbled with the catch. “This is the level of fucking writing I’d expect from a 5 year old! Jesus, DoSaC calls YOU their stupid arse fucking best and THIS is the result? Fucking fuck me, you guys are so dense.”

Now, you are one to accept criticism, sure. You knew you could have improved on this report if he had just told you how. But loyal to your department, Malcolm was just raining insults down on you without even a reason, nor without ways to improve! You stood up.

“THEN FUCKING TELL ME WHAT I SHOULD DO!” You shouted, tears brimming in your eyes. Malcolm was clearly taken aback, before his face darkened.

“THERE ISN’T ANYTHING YOU CAN FUCKING DO! THIS COCK-UP IS SO FUCKING SHITE THAT THERE’S NO HOPE FOR IT! YOU’RE FUCKING DONE!”

“JUST TRY TO HELP ME!” You slammed your hands on the table, and Malcolm slapped them away.

“Nobody FUCKING hits my desk.” Malcolm growled threateningly.

“Well who gives a shit if it’s the PM’s or yours?!” You folded your arms, sneering at him. “And MAYBE if you were more helpful instead of fucking yelling at my workmates, then MAYBE WE COULD GET ACTUAL DECENT SHIT DONE!”

“Ya slipping cunt!” Malcolm waved you away. “Git the fuck out of my sight!”

“No, you get out of my fucking sight. You act like you’re so big and powerful,” You grabbed your coat and folder. “But you know what, Malc? You’re fucking dead inside. A husk. You have no heart for others, and I don’t see how anyone could possibly look at you with some degree of shitfucking affection!” You hastily wiped your tears with a sleeve as you opened the door to leave. “DICK!” You spat out one final insult before you slammed the door closed on him. It was rather weak, and you knew it. You jumped in fright as you heard something hit the door, followed by more yelling. Sobbing, you ran away from his office, and boarded a taxi back to DoSaC.

\-----

“AND DON’T FUCKING COME BACK!” Malcolm roared at the door. He growled as he heard running footsteps outside. The weakling was finally gone.  
He loosened his shoulders and threw his head back. Idiotic idiot! Fucking hell.

Malcolm dropped himself back behind his desk and narrowed his eyes upon seeing the crumpled report on his desk. They must have left it there as they were leaving. Their words echoed in his head. Help them. Malcolm grabbed the offending paper and threw it in the trashbin under his desk. Annoyed that it was still in his presence, he attempted to focus on responding to some emails on his computer. He had barely gotten through one before he sighed.

He took it out of the bin and read it.

…Oh.

Malcolm read through the work thoroughly this time.

..This is actually what he had wanted. They did go through it. It was all there in the papers. He thought.. oh, he thought he wanted a report on something else..  
Malcolm ran a hand through his hair, now frustrated at himself.

Damn it.

\-----

You sniffled slightly as you handed the taxi driver her pay, along with a tip. You felt bad for crying all the way back to DoSaC and she had tried to comfort you when you told her in general why you were feeling like crap.

“Take care of yourself.” She gave you a small smile, before handing you another tissue. You nod and thank her, waving as she drives off to go find another person to carry around. Taking a deep breathe, you turn around and enter your department. You hoped nobody would ask about your report with Malcolm. People knew about your crush on the guy.

“Hey, how’d the report go?” A familiar male with glasses asked. Ollie Reeder looked up at you from his desk, still looking the same way you left him earlier.

Oh no.

The tears decided to come back.

“O-Oh no, don’t cry luv,” Ollie started as he got out of his seat. Ollie moved over to put an arm around your shoulder as another friendly individual wandered over with two cups of tea.

“Hello– What happened? What’s wrong?” The man known as Glenn Cullen asked. He put the two cups of tea down on Ollie’s desk as you desperately tried to dry your tears to no avail. Glenn ran to your desk and wheeled your chair over so you could sit down. The three of you formed a circle in the middle of the workroom.

“M-Malcolm..” You managed to choke out after a while. Ollie breathed out through his nose and put a hand on your shoulder. He handed you a tissue box and you blew your nose, embarrassed at the loud noises you were making. People stopped to stare and then continued on their way.

“What happened?”

“H-He.. oh Ollie, he yelled at me. H-He, hic he was so upset and.. I think he hates me.”

“Aww, Malcolm practically hates everybody.” Glenn leaned back in his seat. “He hates Ollie, hates Nicola, hates me–”

“But I don’t want to be hated by him.” You curled in further in your chair. “I might as well just quit..”

“You can’t!” Ollie immediately retorted. “Not over Malcolm, he’s, he’s always a dickbag. Look, there’s no need to go.”

“Ollie, you should have seen the fire in his eyes!” You sat up straight, slapping your knees for emphasis. “H-He just hates me, we spent an entire hour on this stupid report and then I utterly failed! I can’t look into his eyes again!”

“But you love him.” Glenn quietly said, rubbing your knee. “You walk into work hoping to see him everyday. You look so happy when he does come in, guns ablazing.”

“He doesn’t have to waste his time seeing this miserable piece of shit again.”

“Look, just, you’ll feel better tomorrow. Come on. There’s no need to go.” Ollie pleaded with you.

“I-I’m sorry, I just.. oh he called me the absolute worst. He even said that I was done. I should just go now.” You stood up and trudged to your desk, and began to clean away your belongings. Glenn and Ollie watched from their seats, very much worried and concerned.

“What should we do?” Glenn asked. “Should we just leave her be? Ollie? Ollie.” Ollie was busy typing on his phone.

“Ssh, I’m gonna call Malcolm.”

“Why?”

“I want to hear his side of the story.” Ollie got up and left the room, leaving Glenn to go back to his desk to work.

\-----

“Malcolm.”

“Hey, Malcolm, what happened?”

“I fucked up.” Ollie let out a breathe of surprise.

“No. Really?”

“Yah. I read over the report they gave me again. I fuckin’ thought it was fer something else. Now I realise it was all what I wanted.”

“What exactly did you say to them?”

“The usual.”

“The usual is you being nice to them.” Ollie lowered his voice down. “Malc, they came in and burst into tears!”

“Well, what the fuck am I supposed to do about that? Just let them get over it.”

“Malc, they want to quit.”

A silence hung in the air.

“No fucking way.”

“Yes fucking way, if you don’t stop them!”

“Fuck, what are they doing now?”

“Packing their shit up.”

“Fucking fuck me, anything else I should know?”

“Well, they–”

“Fuck, I gotta go. Fuckity bye, Ollie.”

“But Malcolm–” Malcolm hung up and Ollie huffed. He slipped his phone back into his pocket and headed back to his desk, knowing that Malcolm would take care of the situation.

\-----

It took the rest of the work day to organise your departure. From shredding up papers to cleaning up your desk, but you got there in the end. You had a big box of your things to take home with you tonight. You sighed.

“Thanks Ollie, Glenn, for everything.” You said to them. But only Glenn was in his seat.“Where’s Ollie?”

“Meeting with someone.” Glenn said. He gave you a sad smile. “Are you sure you want to go?”

“I.. like Malcolm enough to just not want to have him see a stupid fuck like me. Maybe I’m not cut out for this job..”

“Is there any way to change your mind?” You shook your head.

“None that I can think of.”

“No wait!” Ollie came in, grinning. “Before you go, there’s someone who’d like to speak to you.”

“The Grim Reaper?” You joked sadly. Ollie shook his head and jerked a thumb behind him.

“Outside. Conference Room A. Leave your stuff for the minute and go.”

“If you say so.” You promptly headed out to the Conference Room, and Ollie gave Glenn a thumbs up.

\-----

Oh no.

Was that..? No.

You hesitated at the door. Through the glass, a familiar man in a grey suit was looking down at his Blackberry, typing. Malcolm was facing away from you.

You were stuck to your spot. Malcolm leaned back in his chair and turned to check on the door. You two held eye contact for a moment.

Run.

Run, that was all you could think of.

You swiftly turned on your heels and took a step. You heard the door open behind you.

“Come back here.” Malcolm ordered calmly. You stopped, and then sighed. You turned around and with your head bowed, walked into the room. You sat down next to Malcolm, and he pulled out the crumpled report from his suitcase. “I looked through yer report.”

“You shouldn’t have. It was a waste of your time.” You mumbled, loud enough for him to hear.

“I made a mistake.”

Silence.

“What do you mean, made a mistake?” You slowly looked up, trying hard to fight back the tears. He was breathing hard, staring down at the paper.

“I thought I had wanted something different. But I read through it properly and remembered this was what I had wanted.”

“O-Oh.”

“I put down some notes for parts you could have improved on.” Malcolm slid the paper towards you. “Felt like I was fuckin’ marking a uni kid’s papers.”

“You could be a teacher.” You said, as you read through his corrections. He praised you on some parts and made recommendations on others. At the end, he had written a few lines on how good you went. Your heart soared at the praise.

“Perhaps I fuckin’ could,” Malcolm grinned slightly, leaning back in his chair. “Luv.”

Your face slowly turned red and you curled in on yourself in the chair over the report. You squeaked slightly as he placed a hand on your shoulder and rubbed it using his thumb.

“I know that’s your favourite nickname.” He smirked. You nodded awkwardly. “So, stay for me.”

Your eyes widen in surprise as Malcolm looks at you with gentle love in his eyes.

“B-But, I..”

“None of what I said earlier was true. But what I will say now is.”

“A-And that is..?” Malcolm did not answer you. He leant in and pressed his lips to yours. His eyes were closed and his face calm as he pushed into the kiss. You pushed him away, face very much red. He frowned at your rejection.

“Y-You’re just making fun of me, aren’t you?” You stammered. “Glenn a-and Ollie must have told you.”

“Told me what?” He raised an eyebrow.

“That I-I..” He placed a finger on your lip.

“I already knew that.” He grinned. “And I love you too. You’re very cute when you’re flustered and doing your best to impress.”

And with that, he captured your lips again. This time, you melted into the kiss, happily wrapping your arms around his neck. He hummed happily, and then the two of you pulled away. He licked his lips.

“You return yer items back to their places on the desk and then we can have more fun.”

Sounded like a good plan.


End file.
